For us there is nothing more elegant and impressive looking than a well executed Squat. Here's some pointers on what we look for in a Squat to help you develop yours.

Top tips for your Squat

🔹Keep your eyes forward. There are other styles of Squats where people will keep their gaze downwards but in our opinion for the vast majority of people it is best to keep your eyes forward.



🔹Grip the bar with your hands as narrow as your shoulder mobility allows. With the one caveat that your hands should never be inside the position of your elbows. This creates good tightness in your upper back and thus helps ensure a strong and stable position.

🔹Feet pointed slightly outwards, weight through the middle of your foot. This again helps ensure you are in a strong and stable position to execute the movement as safely and efficiently as possible.

🔹Core braced and tight. Take a big breath of air and brace your core before initiating the lift, think 360 degrees of pressure round your torso. Hold this breath all the way through the descent and all the way towards the top of the lift after you have passed your sticking point.

🔹Knees following the line of the foot. As you descend it is important your knee follows the line of your foot, this is a nice strong and safe position for your knees. If you find your knees cave in or push excessively outwards take time to work on correcting your technique before trying to lift more top end weights.

🔹Crease of the hip below the top of the knee. This is what we look for as a full range of motion at the bottom of the Squat. There are many big advantages to using a full range of motion, although not everyone will be capable of this at first. If you struggle to achieve full depth, spending time working and your hip and ankle mobility may well be required.

🔹Chest and hips rise at the same rate on the ascent. Try and think of leading the movement out of the bottom position with your chest. This well help achieve the chest and hips rising at the same rate, which is want we want for a good squat.

Learn more and put it into practice

Hopefully you find these tips helpful. These are some of the things we teach during our Personal Training sessions in Glasgow and during our Glasgow Bootcamps. Click on the links to learn more.

Happy squatting team!